Rumors of War and Infernal Machines

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Publisher : Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN 13 : 9780742540354
Total Pages : 326 pages
Book Rating : 4.5/5 (43 download)

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Book Synopsis Rumors of War and Infernal Machines by : Charles E. Gannon

Download or read book Rumors of War and Infernal Machines written by Charles E. Gannon and published by Rowman & Littlefield. This book was released on 2005 with total page 326 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This provocative and unique work reveals the remarkably influential role of futuristic literature on contemporary political power in America. Tracing this phenomenon from its roots in Victorian Britain, Rumors of War and Infernal Machines offers a fascinating exploration of how fictional speculations on emergent or imaginary military technologies profoundly influence the political agendas and actions of modern superpower states. Gannon convincingly demonstrates that military fiction anticipated and even influenced the evolution of the tank, the development of the airplane, and also the bitter political battles within Britain's War Office and the Admiralty. In the United States, future-fictions and Cold-War thrillers were an officially acknowledged factor in the Pentagon's research and development agendas, and often gave rise_and shape_to the nation's strategic development of technologies as diverse as automation, atomic weaponry, aerospace vehicles, and the Strategic Defense Initiative ('Star Wars'). His book reveals a striking relationship between the increasing political influence of speculative military fiction and the parallel rise of superpower states and their technocentric ideologies. With its detailed political, historical, and literary analysis of U.S. and British fascination with hi-tech warfare, this lively and revealing study will appeal to students, literary and cultural scholars, military and history enthusiasts, and general readers.

Shadows of the New Sun

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 1846310571
Total Pages : 272 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (463 download)

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Book Synopsis Shadows of the New Sun by : Peter Wright

Download or read book Shadows of the New Sun written by Peter Wright and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection of interviews and essays places under one cover an amazing selection of difficult-to-find resources for the avid Gene Wolfe reader and scholar. The essays concern the nature of writing, including character, structure and the profession of the writer. Also included are a series of interviews with Wolfe and the holy grail of 'New Sun' aficionados: Books in the Book of the New Sun, previously only available in a rare small-press volume.

Science Fiction and Empire

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Publisher : Liverpool University Press
ISBN 13 : 1846310245
Total Pages : 226 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (463 download)

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Book Synopsis Science Fiction and Empire by : Patricia Kerslake

Download or read book Science Fiction and Empire written by Patricia Kerslake and published by Liverpool University Press. This book was released on 2007-01-01 with total page 226 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From its beginnings, science fiction has experimented with imperialistic scenarios of alien invasion, extraterrestrial exploitation, xenophobia, and colonial conquest. In Science Fiction and Empire, Patricia Kerslake brings contemporary thinking about postcolonialism and imperialism to bear on a variety of classic sci-fi novels and films, including The War of the Worlds, Stanislaw Lem’s Solaris, and Star Wars. The first book to identify the consequences of empire in science fiction, Kerslake’s study is a compelling investigation of the political ramifications of how we imagine our future. “Science Fiction and Empire is thought-provoking and insightful, . . . the kind of large-scale postcolonial work that science fiction has needed for quite some time.”—Science Fiction Studies

The Country You Have Never Seen

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0853238693
Total Pages : 311 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (532 download)

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Book Synopsis The Country You Have Never Seen by : Joanna Russ

Download or read book The Country You Have Never Seen written by Joanna Russ and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2007 with total page 311 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In 1959, at the age of 22, Joanna Russ published her first science fiction story, "Nor Custom Stale," in The Magazine of Science Fiction and Fantasy. In the forty-five years since, Russ has continued to write some of the most popular, creative, and important novels and stories in science fiction. She was a central figure, along with contemporaries Ursula K. Le Guin and James Tiptree, in revolutionizing science fiction in the 1960s and 1970s, and her 1970 novel, The Female Man, is widely regarded as one of the most successful and influential depictions of a feminist utopia in the entire genre. The Country You Have Never Seen gathers Joanna Russ's most important essays and reviews, revealing the vital part she played over the years in the never-ending conversation among writers and fans about the roles, boundaries, and potential of science fiction. Spanning her entire career, the collection shines a light on Russ's role in the development of new wave science fiction and feminist science fiction, while at the same time providing fascinating insight into her own development as a writer.

May the Armed Forces Be with You

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Publisher : McFarland
ISBN 13 : 0786497424
Total Pages : 251 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (864 download)

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Book Synopsis May the Armed Forces Be with You by : Stephen Dedman

Download or read book May the Armed Forces Be with You written by Stephen Dedman and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2016-09-13 with total page 251 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Science fiction and the United States military often inhabit the same imaginative space. Weapons technology has taken inspiration from science fiction, from the bazooka and the atomic bomb to weaponized lasers and drones. Star-spangled superheroes sold war bonds in comic books sent to GIs during World War II, and adorned the noses of bombers. The same superheroes now appear in big-budget movies made with military assistance, fighting evil in today's war zones. A missile shield of laser satellites--dreamed up by writers and embraced by the high command--is partially credited with ending the Cold War. Sci-fi themes and imagery are used to sell weapons programs, military service and wars to the public. Some science fiction creators have willingly cooperated with the military; others have been conscripted. Some have used the genre as a forum for protest. This book examines the relationship between the U.S. military and science fiction through more than 80 years of novels, comics, films and television series, including Captain America, Starship Troopers, The Twilight Zone, Dr. Strangelove, Star Trek, Iron Man, Bill the Galactic Hero, The Forever War, Star Wars, Aliens, Ender's Game, Space: Above and Beyond and Old Man's War.

Cities Under Siege

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Publisher : Verso Books
ISBN 13 : 1844678369
Total Pages : 434 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (446 download)

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Book Synopsis Cities Under Siege by : Stephen Graham

Download or read book Cities Under Siege written by Stephen Graham and published by Verso Books. This book was released on 2011-11-01 with total page 434 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Cities are the new battleground of our increasingly urban world. From the slums of the global South to the wealthy financial centers of the West, Cities Under Siege traces the spread of political violence through the sites, spaces, infrastructure and symbols of the world’s rapidly expanding metropolitan areas. Drawing on a wealth of original research, Stephen Graham shows how Western militaries and security forces now perceive all urban terrain as a conflict zone inhabited by lurking shadow enemies. Urban inhabitants have become targets that need to be continually tracked, scanned and controlled. Graham examines the transformation of Western armies into high-tech urban counter-insurgency forces. He looks at the militarization and surveillance of international borders, the use of ‘security’ concerns to suppress democratic dissent, and the enacting of legislation to suspend civilian law. In doing so, he reveals how the New Military Urbanism permeates the entire fabric of urban life, from subway and transport networks hardwired with high-tech ‘command and control’ systems to the insidious militarization of a popular culture corrupted by the all-pervasive discourse of ‘terrorism.’

The American Experiment and the Idea of Democracy in British Culture, 1776–1914

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Author :
Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1317045246
Total Pages : 403 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (17 download)

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Book Synopsis The American Experiment and the Idea of Democracy in British Culture, 1776–1914 by : Ruth Livesey

Download or read book The American Experiment and the Idea of Democracy in British Culture, 1776–1914 written by Ruth Livesey and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2016-04-01 with total page 403 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In nineteenth-century Britain, the effects of democracy in America were seen to spread from Congress all the way down to the personal habits of its citizens. Bringing together political theorists, historians, and literary scholars, this volume explores the idea of American democracy in nineteenth-century Britain. The essays span the period from Independence to the First World War and trace an intellectual history of Anglo-American relations during that period. Leading scholars trace the hopes and fears inspired by the American model of democracy in the works of commentators, including Thomas Paine, Mary Wollstonecraft, Alexis de Tocqueville, Charles Dickens, John Stuart Mill, Richard Cobden, Charles Dilke, Matthew Arnold, Henry James and W. T. Stead. By examining the context of debates about American democracy and notions of ’culture’, citizenship, and race, the collection sheds fresh light on well-documented moments of British political history, such as the Reform Acts, the Abolition of Slavery Act, and the Anti-Corn Law agitation. The volume also explores the ways in which British Liberalism was shaped by the American example and draws attention to the importance of print culture in furthering radical political dialogue between the two nations. As the comprehensive introduction makes clear, this collection makes an important contribution to transatlantic studies and our growing sense of a nineteenth-century modernity shaped by an Atlantic exchange. It is an essential reference point for all interested in the history of the idea of democracy, its political evolution, and its perceived cultural consequences.

Death Rays and the Popular Media, 1876-1939

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Publisher : McFarland
ISBN 13 : 0786499222
Total Pages : 281 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (864 download)

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Book Synopsis Death Rays and the Popular Media, 1876-1939 by : William J. Fanning, Jr.

Download or read book Death Rays and the Popular Media, 1876-1939 written by William J. Fanning, Jr. and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2015-07-29 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Death rays! Absurd idea peddled by con artists and amateurs and promoted by a sensationalist press? Not quite. Government and military leaders and mainstream scientists endorsed the possibility of such a fantastic weapon in the years before World War II. A concept born out of research with electricity and other energy sources, the death ray or "directed energy weapon" was widely reported for nearly five decades. Claims for its invention appeared as early as 1876, and increased thereafter, until the "death-ray craze" of the 1920s and 1930s. The idea influenced fiction, making its way from newspapers and magazines into novels, short stories, films, theatrical productions and other media. This book takes a first-ever look at the historical death ray and its impact on fiction and popular culture.

Locating Science Fiction

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 1846318424
Total Pages : 257 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (463 download)

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Book Synopsis Locating Science Fiction by : Andrew Milner

Download or read book Locating Science Fiction written by Andrew Milner and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2012 with total page 257 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A major, groundbreaking intervention into contemporary theoretical debates about SF. It effects a series of vital shifts in SF theory and criticism, away from prescriptively abstract dialectics of cognition and estrangement and towards the empirically grounded understanding of an amalgam of texts, practices and artefacts.

Solar Flares

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 1846318343
Total Pages : 313 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (463 download)

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Book Synopsis Solar Flares by : Andrew M. Butler

Download or read book Solar Flares written by Andrew M. Butler and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2012 with total page 313 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The politics of science fiction books, films and television in the 1970s.

Reordering the World

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Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691197172
Total Pages : 456 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (911 download)

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Book Synopsis Reordering the World by : Duncan Bell

Download or read book Reordering the World written by Duncan Bell and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2019-10-22 with total page 456 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A magisterial study...by a historian at the top of his game. Political theorists, intellectual historians, and students of empire are once again in Duncan Bell's debt for his deep research, elegant analysis, and consistently acute judgments."--David Armitage, Harvard Universityrsity

Identify and Sort

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Publisher : Oxford University Press
ISBN 13 : 0190651431
Total Pages : 281 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (96 download)

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Book Synopsis Identify and Sort by : Josef Teboho Ansorge

Download or read book Identify and Sort written by Josef Teboho Ansorge and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2016-06-20 with total page 281 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The advent of information technology ushered in new forms of political power. Machines play crucial roles in how states see, understand, and act, and scrutiny of these processes lies at the heart of Identify and Sort. It frames debates about IT in world politics, explaining how industrial sorting systems employed by political actors are renegotiating the social contract between individuals and the state. Ansorge takes the reader on a global expedition that tracks the historical antecedents of digital power, from Aztec and Inca rituals, to medieval filing systems, to a grandiose 1930s design for a German registry, to the databases used in US presidential campaigns and how IT is deployed in war and post-conflict reconstruction. Databases are also deployed virtually to record and act upon people who have no publicly visible identification or group consciousness; modern wars and election campaigns are fought on this individualised terrain. The uneven distribution of these technical capacities engenders inequality of access, while rights discourses and legal frameworks forged in an era of mass group discrimination, subjugation, and public resistance lag behind these micro-targeting practices. Rich in examples and ideas, Identify and Sort develops an analytical model and vocabulary to explain the functions and limits of digital power in world politics.

The Military Techno-Thriller

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Author :
Publisher : Nader Elhefnawy
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 197 pages
Book Rating : 4./5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis The Military Techno-Thriller by : Nader Elhefnawy

Download or read book The Military Techno-Thriller written by Nader Elhefnawy and published by Nader Elhefnawy. This book was released on 2019-05-30 with total page 197 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: THE MILITARY TECHNO-THRILLER: A HISTORY takes a close look at this widely read but still little studied genre, tracing its origins from the Victorian-era invasion story, to its 1980s heyday as king of the bestseller list in the hands of authors like Tom Clancy, down to today, considering its interaction with other genres and other media throughout. In the process, this book also tells the larger story of how the ways in which we think about, imagine and portray war have evolved during the last century.

Shipwreck in Art and Literature

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Publisher : Routledge
ISBN 13 : 1136161538
Total Pages : 284 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (361 download)

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Book Synopsis Shipwreck in Art and Literature by : Carl Thompson

Download or read book Shipwreck in Art and Literature written by Carl Thompson and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2014-05-09 with total page 284 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Tales of shipwreck have always fascinated audiences, and as a result there is a rich literature of suffering at sea, and an equally rich tradition of visual art depicting this theme. Exploring the shifting semiotics and symbolism of shipwreck, the interdisciplinary essays in this volume provide a history of a major literary and artistic motif as they consider how depictions have varied over time, and across genres and cultures. Simultaneously, they explore the imaginative potential of shipwreck as they consider the many meanings that have historically attached to maritime disaster and suffering at sea. Spanning both popular and high culture, and addressing a range of political, spiritual, aesthetic and environmental concerns, this cross-cultural, comparative study sheds new light on changing attitudes to the sea, especially in the West. In particular, it foregrounds the role played by the maritime in the emergence of Western modernity, and so will appeal not only to those interested in literature and art, but also to scholars in history, geography, international relations, and postcolonial studies.

Practicing Science Fiction

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Publisher : McFarland
ISBN 13 : 078645783X
Total Pages : 227 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (864 download)

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Book Synopsis Practicing Science Fiction by : Karen Hellekson

Download or read book Practicing Science Fiction written by Karen Hellekson and published by McFarland. This book was released on 2014-01-10 with total page 227 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Drawn from the Science Fiction Research Association conference held in Lawrence, Kansas, in 2008, the essays in this volume address intersections among the reading, writing, and teaching of science fiction. Part 1 studies the teaching of SF, placing analytical and pedagogical research next to each other to reveal how SF can be both an object of study as well as a teaching tool for other disciplines. Part 2 examines SF as a genre of mediation between the sciences and the humanities, using close readings and analyses of the literary-scientific nexus. Part 3 examines SF in the media, using specific television programs, graphic novels, and films as examples of how SF successfully transcends the medium of transmission. Finally, Part 4 features close readings of SF texts by women, including Joanna Russ, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Octavia E. Butler.

Dreamworlds of Race

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Publisher : Princeton University Press
ISBN 13 : 0691235112
Total Pages : 484 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (912 download)

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Book Synopsis Dreamworlds of Race by : Duncan Bell

Download or read book Dreamworlds of Race written by Duncan Bell and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2022-06-07 with total page 484 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How transatlantic thinkers in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries promoted the unification of Britain and the United States Between the late nineteenth century and the First World War an ocean-spanning network of prominent individuals advocated the unification of Britain and the United States. They dreamt of the final consolidation of the Angloworld. Scholars, journalists, politicians, businessmen, and science fiction writers invested the “Anglo-Saxons” with extraordinary power. The most ambitious hailed them as a people destined to bring peace and justice to the earth. More modest visions still imagined them as likely to shape the twentieth century. Dreamworlds of Race explores this remarkable moment in the intellectual history of racial domination, political utopianism, and world order. Focusing on a quartet of extraordinary figures—Andrew Carnegie, W. T. Stead, Cecil J. Rhodes, and H. G. Wells—Duncan Bell shows how unionists on both sides of the Atlantic reimagined citizenship, empire, patriotism, race, war, and peace in their quest to secure global supremacy. Yet even as they dreamt of an Anglo-dominated world, the unionists disagreed over the meaning of race, the legitimacy of imperialism, the nature of political belonging, and the ultimate form and purpose of unification. The racial dreamworld was an object of competing claims and fantasies. Exploring speculative fiction as well as more conventional forms of political writing, Bell reads unionist arguments as expressions of the utopianism circulating through fin-de-siècle Anglo-American culture, and juxtaposes them with pan-Africanist critiques of racial domination and late twentieth-century fictional narratives of Anglo-American empire. Tracing how intellectual elites promoted an ambitious project of political and racial unification between Britain and the United States, Dreamworlds of Race analyzes ideas of empire and world order that reverberate to this day.

Gothic Science Fiction 1980-2010

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Publisher : Liverpool University Press
ISBN 13 : 184631707X
Total Pages : 241 pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (463 download)

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Book Synopsis Gothic Science Fiction 1980-2010 by : Sara Wasson

Download or read book Gothic Science Fiction 1980-2010 written by Sara Wasson and published by Liverpool University Press. This book was released on 2011-01-01 with total page 241 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Gothic fiction's focus on the irrational and supernatural would seem to conflict with science fiction's rational foundations. However, as this novel collection demonstrates, the two categories often intersect in rich and revealing ways. Analyzing a range of works—including literature, film, graphic novels, and trading card games—from the past three decades through the lens of this hybrid genre, this volume examines their engagement with the era's dramatic changes in communication technology, medical science, and personal and global politics.